


Run Runaway

by Teigh



Series: Pedestrian Wolves [5]
Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werecreatures, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-12
Updated: 2013-01-12
Packaged: 2017-11-25 06:17:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/635987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teigh/pseuds/Teigh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Mikey runs, he only goes as far as Chicago.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Run Runaway

**Author's Note:**

> Part of the _Pedestrian Wolves_ 'verse.

When Mikey runs, he only goes as far as Chicago. It’s far enough – not quite the middle of the country, but equidistant from LA and New Jersey. Gerard would appreciate the geographic metaphor, but Mikey doesn’t care about poetics– he just knows it will take time for people coming from either direction to find him, which will give him the warning he needs. Warning to do what exactly is a little unclear, but the destination felt safe – safer than where he was before anyway – and that’s all he really needs.

In Chicago he hits the ground running, doesn’t even give himself time to adjust, moving as quickly as he can through the airport, his bag bumping against his thigh, surrogate for his nervousness.

His hand looks strange, stretched too thin, so Mikey hesitates before knocking. The door swings open as he’s closing his hand into a fist.

Pete stares at him, smudged eyeliner making him look like a surprised raccoon.

“I’m not here.” He said.  
“Okay.” Pete leaned on the door. “So…should I invite you in, or just wait to see if you can cross the threshold on your own?”  
Mikey snorted, and tossed his duffel bag into the front hall.  
Pete grinned and opened the door wide enough to let him pass.

“So…you’re not here.”  
“No.”  
“If someone asks, I haven’t seen you…”  
“In the last month.”  
“Right.” 

The front door closes. When the deadbolt slides into place, Mikey finally lets himself relax. Not completely, just enough to sag against the wall and close his eyes.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Pete’s close, the words ghosting hot against Mikey’s ear. He doesn’t move away from the unexpected proximity, but doesn’t open his eyes either. A finger pokes him in the ribs and Mikey flinches. He has no idea what’s showing on his face, but Pete steps back, hands spread wide.

“I can’t… I don’t…”

Pete shakes his head. “Never mind. The sheets in the guestroom are clean. Relatively clean, at least.”

Mikey knows the way.

~~~~

Mikey paces, catching the faint tail ends of conversations. Curiosity stirs in him, but he likes the quiet too much to pursue the words. He sticks to filling the empty spaces in the back of the house, his limbs once again awkward, leaving him counting out steps for safety. Two days, and Mikey has memorized the length of the back hall, the perimeter of the backyard. He learns to dodge the corner table at the top of the second floor stairs. He counts out each step, pace and stride, the feel of toes against wool pile in the corridor between guest bedroom and the main bath. Mikey counts, tries to push the numbers forward, white noise of 10 and 27 set forth to drown out the mutters he catches. The knot in his chest grows.

When he’s not pacing, Mikey huddles in a cocoon of blankets on the bed, back wedged into the corner.

On the third day, Pete appears. Silent, eyes dark, he pulls Mikey up, fingers wrapping loosely around one wrist. Mikey sighs but doesn’t pull free, and lets himself be led down to the living room.

The TV is on, turned to some action movie. The rest of Fall Out Boy is there; they glance up, identical accessing glints in their eyes. Mikey takes a deep breath, fights the twined, inexplicable urges to bare his throat or flee. Pete pushes him down onto the couch next to Patrick, who smiles and hands him a coffee mug. Pete spoons up behind Mikey, and Patrick moves closer, hand wrapping loosely around his forearm. There’s a rustle of movement and Mikey is surrounded by warmth. He glances down – Joe and Andy have settled on the floor, shoulders pressing close, on either side of his legs. Mikey swallows, throat clicking. Peter murmurs, tilting his head to rest on Mikey's shoulder. Mikey closes his eyes and concentrates on the familiar scent of his hair, willing the tears prickling in his eyes to disappear. He drinks his coffee quickly, before his hands can start to shake. Callused fingers take the empty mug from his hands. The conversation picks up around him, its cadence familiar. Mikey focuses on the car chase careening across the TV screen, relaxing slowly, surrounded by borrowed family.

So his routine changes. For the next four days, they pull him out of himself, into their midst. Mikey can’t help wallowing – he feels safe, almost right, for the first time in…in a very long time. He doesn’t think, doesn’t try to track or outline when the world became dangerous. He lets himself sink into the offered comfort of his friends as they hold him firmly into the world, and argue about Bruce Willis or punk’s portrayal in mainstream media. Mikey dozes, safe.

On the eighth day, Mikey can’t settle. He’s wide-awake and twitchy. He spends the first half of the day playing chicken with his sidekick –picks it up, holds it, sets it aside, over and over. Around two, Mikey just puts it down and walks the house. Back and forth, back and forth – he tries to ignore the voices filtering up from the kitchen, but fragments of conversation catch and snag.

“Gerard’s going to be pissed,” Patrick says.  
“It doesn’t matter,” Pete replies. There’s a clatter of plates, the sound of water running. None of that masks Pete’s frustration. “He wants to be…”  
“Pete. They're fucking frantic.”  
“How do you know that?”  
“How do you think?”  
“Bob.”  
“Bob is a friend. He’s our friend, Pete…”  
“Yeah, yeah, but Mikey….”

And Mikey forces himself away. He doesn’t want to hear what Bob is to them. Mikey paces, feels his lip curl at the thought of Bob’s past, at the possibility of anyone else having a _claim_ tie to _his_ their drummer. He walks and walks, but the knot in his chest grows heavier. Mikey begins to feel motion sick as the night descends. He finally staggers to the bathroom, falls to his knees hard enough to know he's going to bruise. Mikey clutches the smooth white curve of the toilet's porcelain. He pants, trying to take in air – he's never felt this claustrophobic before. Sweat runs from into his eyes and the pressure on his sternum increases. He pulls in another shaky breath and hears Joe in the hall. 

“Hey Pete, have you seen Mikey?”

And that’s all Mikey needs. At the sound of Joe’s voice, the big messy knot that sits in his chest suddenly unravels, all at once. That tangled knot has always been there, a rock pushing against his chest and weighing him down. The abrupt lightness knocks him to the ground; absence of its constant pressure has him whimpering. A flash of sharp pain races through him, but it’s fleeting. But now he can’t lift himself up off the floor, he’s overwhelmed by smells. Mikey can't help it, he cries out. 

The sound is loud and suddenly the doorway is full of his friends. All of them are wide-eyed – except for Pete, who just looks resigned… and maybe jealous?

“Fuck,” Joe says, his eyes wide. “Oh god, Bob’s going to kill me!”

Andy snorts, and looks over Joe’s shoulder at Mikey. “If that asshole had manned up, instead of being a coward…”

Mikey growls at that. He's pleased by how the sound echoes against the tile. No one talks shit about his band.

Andy leans his head against Joe’s, before slipping into the bathroom. He grabs something from the counter and crouches down in front of Mikey.

“Take a look, Mikeyway, and then think long and hard about bitching.”

Andy’s holding a mirror.   
Puzzled, Mikey looks into it.  
A dark-furred wolf looks back.

~~~

Hurley drops down to sit cross-legged on the bathroom floor in front of Mikey. 

“Okay. Picture your hands. Feel the shape of them, the length of your fingers, how they curl around the neck of your bass…”

Mikey rests his muzzle on his paws and closes his eyes.

He can feel the neck of his bass, heavy and smooth in his palm, the press of strings under his fingers.

When he opens his eyes, Mikey is sprawled out on the bathroom floor, fingers spread wide against the white tile. The iron foot of the bathtub is digging into his hip.

For a moment he panics, not wanting the internal weight to return.

“Hey,” Hurley says, resting a hand on his shoulder.

Mikey takes a deep breath and realizes the weight is just… gone. There’s a different sort of tension in its place… but that feels like expectation, awareness. It feels like finally waking up, but without the three cups of coffee it normally takes for him to get there.

Mikey just focuses on his breath. Then he looks up, meets Andy’s eyes.

“How?” he says, the word awkward in his mouth.

Andy shrugged. “Do you feel different? Like something inside has opened, or has broken free and you can know feel the surface of the whole world?”

The words aren’t right, but the feeling is. Mikey nods slowly and sits up, unconcerned about his nudity.

Andy smiles. “Then it’s always been there.”

Mikey frowns. "But how..."

Before he can finish the question, there’s a sudden heavy press of air and where Hurley had been sitting is a wolf – red-furred and lithe, watching Mikey with cautious eyes. Mikey gasps and the world seems to shift – and he's pressing his muzzle against the other wolf’s neck.

~~~

Three days later, Mikey calls Bob.

“I’m fine… I…” He shakes his head. “I hope you are all doing…” and he clicks the phone closed. Mikey bows his head and misses home.


End file.
